Gavin wrote:I think most people who knock Ryan air have never actually flown them, but having had the delight to fly them to Dublin from Bristol many times- from £1 each way- all in I really cant say anything but thanks to them.
The people who knock them are those who take overweight baggage, forget to print their boarding pass etc, then you do get stung, long may they continue as you subside those that know how to play the ryan air game!
If they can manage Transatlantic then everyone will be quids inn, as it will drive everyone fairs down.
You only got to look at the Demise of Travelcity to see the result on flights to Orlando- Up over 70% since they went bust.
I think it is incredibly patronising to think that those who criticise are those who have never flown with them, or too stupid to work out how to do it.
I also find that there's a myth about 1 pound fares. With my luggage checked in (no, I'm not trying to squeeze that bag overhead with the rest of the skinflints), a 15 quid fare becomes 130 quid easily, and the idea that they are "low cost" is really blown away. Thats when you get those, you don't see those to the likes of Alicante very much, they're priced exactly as expensive as the rest of the airways, and what BA etc used to charge before they pulled out on the back of the occasional times they did that flights near that price (I did get a 51 quid return to budapest once in 2007).
I refused to fly them again when they upped the price of luggage in the hold, and dropped it quietly to 15kg, making it barely worth it anyway. I didn't find them particularly awful apart from the fact their fares were rarely that much of a bargain, often flew out at 7am which doesn't suit me, and didn't fly to airports I actually wanted.
The idea that you'll get a fare to the likes of the US significantly cheaper than the current airlines, will usually turn out, like Norweigan, who claimed similar cheap fares, but when the like for like comparison was done (luggage in the hold), turned out be 20 quid cheaper than virgin flying the route (and I doubt you'd get cheap IFE on Norweigan, as well as food, alcohol and the likes, so will probably turn out to be cheaper to fly with virgin).